mercoledì 11 aprile 2012

This
month’s featured artist is an amazing italian illustrator: Natalia Pierandrei
(also known as Nati).

I
discovered her works years ago, through a pixel art contest inspired by her
illustrations, in the end I didn’t entered the competition, but fell in love
with her art!

What I love
the most in her works are the use of colors, the details on dresses, hair and
also background elements, and the romantic and magic feelings that her
characters evoke: there's something in her art that reminds me Pre-Rafaelite paintings.

You can
find more informations on Nati’s art on her DA gallery, fb page, blog, website and Etsy shop (she sells prints and various paper goodies based on her
illustrations, like paperdolls, postcards, bookmarks, ...).

Here are some of her illustrations, it wasn’t easy to choose only a few, because I love almost all her works!

mercoledì 4 aprile 2012

In my last postI
mentioned that I recently started collecting Monster High dolls, here is a
little review of the ones I already own :)

Monster high dolls were released in 2010 and they are inspired by monster
movies and horror fiction in general: in fact all the characters are the
offsprings of famous monsters like Dracula (Draculaura), Frankenstein (Frankie
Stein), the Mummy (Cleo and Nefera DeNIle), etc.

Since these dolls aren't "born" to be collected, but just as
common toys (though I am not very sure about this, since they came with a stand
included in the box, they have some very little parts and they are a bit
fragile for children's playing) , they are easy to find even in supermarkets
and they aren't very expensive. However I've notice that the price varies a lot
from shop to shop and sometimes internet is the best option: for example in my
city Operetta's price varies from 26 € to 30 €,
while I found (and bought) her at 24€ shipping included on the net.

What I like the most about these dolls are the
details of their outfits, the softness and shine of the hair (kanekalon fibers)
and the fully articulated bodies (there are also some "create-your-monster"
kits, with alternative body parts to assemble new characters, I want the
skeleton and dragon girl sets!).

Right now my collection includes Operetta,
Spectra Vondergeist and Cleo DeNile.

Operetta is the daughter of the Phantom of the Opera, she has a beautiful rockabilly inspired hairdo with victory rolls and a casual outfit with musical accents (accessories, arm tattoo and face "scar", covered by a music note-shaped mask). Her package also includes a coffin-shaped guitar, her spider pet Memphis (with Elvis Presley-styled hair), her diary, a plastic stand and a brush.

Spectra Vondergeist is the daughter of the Ghosts, so her arms and legs ends are made of transparent plastic, like they're disappearing, and she has a lot of chain accessories (maybe a recall to Jacob Marley's ghost from "A Christmas Carol). Her package also included a drawstrings pouch-shaped bag, her ghost ferret pet Rhuen, her diary, a plastic stand and a brush.

Cleo DeNile is the daughter of the Mummy, she has long hair with dark green and gold highlights, a tipycal egyptian makeup, clthes with bandage details and accessories (mostly golden) that recall egyptian art. In these pictures she wear her alternative outfit with some accessories from the basic one, because I thought it was more "mummy-like". Her package also included a plastic folder, her diary, a plastic stand and a brush (she doen't have a pet because mine is the second version).

Overall I can say that I'm really satisfied with the quality of the dolls and I will probably buy more (and maybe sew some custom clothes!), now I'm looking forward to buy Cupid (sadly she will not be released in Italy, so I'll have to search her online) and Rochelle Goyle.